Brothers
by Kage Chikara
Summary: What if, when he was at the lake trying to overcome his depression, instead of asking to see Valentine, Ender had originally asked to see Peter. Oneshot.


Author's Notes: It has been a LONG time since I finished any fan fiction. Inspired to write this after rereading Ender's Game. I will have Peter's children. Anyway. All of this is copyright Orson Scott Card. Apologies for the uninspired title.

Premise: What if, when he was at the lake being all depressed, Ender asked to see Peter.

Brothers

"Go to hell."

Graff almost didn't register the words because the tone was so flat. He looked down at the beautiful fourteen-year-old boy, and saw the contempt in those dark eyes, the sadistic amusement in those sensuous lips. He quelled the urge to slap Peter, just to get rid of that look.

"I think I can make a compelling argument or two." Graff said instead. He wondered for the twentieth time why the boy didn't ask for the sister. She would have taken so much less work to convince, and in the end, he believed she would have done the most good. This boy, this vicious monster—Graff cannot find it in himself to believe Peter can help Ender.

But Ender had asked. In three months, it was the only thing he had asked for. They had talked to him, cajoled him, almost pleaded with him to see Valentine. And he had looked at them with cold, dead eyes that made Graff shiver inwardly with guilt and said, "I want to see Peter."

He would not be moved from this position. He would not explain. And he would not help them. So Graff had come here, to see this boy with his cold eyes and try to convince him to help save the person Peter hated most in the world.

"Dazzle me." Peter drawled, his tone jibing.

Graff kept his expression flat to avoid letting the boy know he had needled him. "For instance, we know who Locke and Demosthenes are." He motioned the I.F. car by the curb. "Get in, please." They were in front of the boy's school, and he felt exposed out there.

Or perhaps he just wanted the trappings of authority so he felt more on even ground with this brilliant child who reminded him not at all of his brother.

Peter got in. Opened the door and slid into the seat, hooking his hands behind his head and assuming a comfortable pose. He looked like sitting in the car had been his goal all along and Graff had just reminded him of it. Nonetheless, it felt like a victory. Graff got in on the other side and motioned the driver to start the drive.

"I admit it, I'm curious. After not a letter or a word, why does my pissant of a little brother want to talk to me? Why not dear Valentine? And why should the I.F. give a shit—pardon my French—about what Ender Wiggin wants?"

Careful, Graff reminded himself. He has to be careful, and even then, he can't imagine how he's going to convince Peter to help Ender. He can't imagine how he's going to convince Peter to help _anyone._ "He asked for you. None of us can figure out why. And we care because he won't…do anything else. He's completely lost energy, focus. He refuses to continue with his education and we can't do anything to help him."

Peter's eyes glowed a little and Graff almost smiled. _That's what you wanted to hear, isn't it? You want to be the one depended on, you want him to fail and you'll go because you want to see that for yourself. You know we've messed this up and you like throwing it back in our face. You may be so much smarter than the rest of us, little boy, but you're just a bully under all of that and I can play you too._

"So you want me to—do what? Go in there, wave my magic wand around and fix him? Tell him he needs to get his ass in gear to be the savior of humanity? I know you've read my profile." Peter's eyes hold immense cruelty. "I don't fix things. You saw the monitor reports, you've read all your carefully constructed little files—you had better have people down there ready to interfere, because if I go to see him, I'm going to tear him apart so you'll never be able to put him back together."

Graff wanted to yell at the driver to turn the car around, to take Peter back and tell Ender he wouldn't come. But Ender would know that if Graff really tried, Peter _would_ come and he wouldn't ever forgive him. And they would have lost him. "You can fix things, Locke." He said instead. "You can speak with rationality, can make people want what you want. And if the buggers get us all, then there won't be much for you to rule, will there?"

He was playing such a fine line here. If anyone from the I.F. heard this conversation, they would think he was mad to encourage the boy's delusions. But Graff knew better, and if Peter Wiggin wasn't running at _least_ a country by the time he was an adult, then it would be because someone had put a bullet in the back of his skull. And Graff couldn't decide which of those options would be better.

"…Why me?" Peter said again.

"I don't know." Graff answered.

Peter thought he knew. And Graff was right. Ender was a tool—his tool, even. If he fixed him up and gave him the pat on the back he had always wanted from his older brother, Ender would go out and save the Earth so Peter could rule it. And it would be great fun to oh-so-casually mention this to Valentine, oh, by the way, the brother you love, the one you miss because you think he's _so _much better than me—he asked for me. Not you, Val. Me. So maybe he would do it, go out there and tell Ender all the words he wanted to hear. He was getting better at that, these days.

But even as Peter thought it, he knew that he was going to doom them all, that as soon as he saw Ender it would all bubble to the surface, the old hatred and sadism and he would find the right words to wound Ender and tear him open, because every time he touched the back of his neck, the old scar reminded him he wasn't good enough. _I'm coming for you, little brother, little Third, so you had better have gotten strong, because even though I'll be sorry afterwards and despite all my claims to rationality, and sanity, I don't forgive you. You wanted me, Ender?_

_You'll regret that soon enough._

Ender lay on his back, his fingers trailing through the water, making little whirlpools by flicking his fingers against the surface of the lake. He cannot find it in himself to care whether he moves or not.

Then footsteps rustled through the grass and the monster stood there. Ender sat up. He felt his new muscles shift under his skin, and tried to take confidence from them. He can remember Bonzo breaking under him and all he felt was disgust. He looked at Peter. Peter had grown more beautiful with time, his features crafted from refined cruelty, like a knife made of diamond.

"Hey, bugger." Peter said.

Ender had told himself a thousand and one times that he will look at Peter and it will all dissipate, that the horrible fear inside him will become a kind of relief, as he realized that what he had been afraid of was just another child, another Bonzo or Stilson, not some demon in human flesh but a human being trying too hard to be demonic.

But it did not and that brought another kind of relief. That was why he had asked for Peter, wasn't it? He knew if they called Valentine he would remember that he loved her, that she loved him, that she would try to console him.

He didn't deserve to be consoled. He didn't deserve to comforted or loved. He feared that if she saw him now it would taint everything, ruin everything. He was terrified that she would fear him. Let her remember him as her beloved, innocent little brother, not the monster he was now.

Seeing Peter was his punishment for Bonzo, for Stilson, for hurting Bean, for playing their game for so long, for believing their lies, for killing the Giant—he didn't know what it was for. Maybe he just needed to look at Peter and realize that this wasn't his mirror, that Peter was far worse than he would ever be.

Maybe he needed to look at Peter and see his reflection in him.

"Hi." He said, and he hated how his voice sounded like a little kid's, a little whimpering child who didn't know what to say to Peter, who had never known what to say to Peter.

Peter surveyed him and smiled. Ender shuddered. The smile widened. "So you're not going to fight the buggers, little Third? Too afraid you'll shit your pants the first time you have to kill?" Peter's crudities don't unnerve Ender. It reminded him too much of Battle School. Just like home. Only it wasn't, not anymore "Afraid you'll like it?" Peter murmured.

"Go to hell." Ender said, getting up. He wasn't taller than Peter, though he noticed with some pleasure that he was more well muscled. Then he thought of Bonzo breaking under him and his pleasure dissipated.

Peter stared at him, and his eyes were cold.

He'll kill me, Ender thought with a thrill of pleasure. That would solve everything, right? "I built a raft." He said quietly. It was the only thing he was proud of in the last four years of his life.

"Why me?" Peter asked.

"Because I'm sick of games." Ender whispered, feeling bowed. He was too tired for Peter's games.

Peter looked at him for a minute, then laughed. "I'm going to rule the world." He told Ender. And he told his brother about what he was doing with Valentine, about Locke and Demosthenes and he saw Ender's pain at Valentine's betrayal and he reveled in it.

"Probably." Ender conceded. "You'll probably rule the world." He said.

Peter looked at him for a minute. "Kill the buggers."

"No." Ender said and meant it. "No." It should have felt good to realize that he could give up all of this so easily, that he could say no I won't to Peter and Graff and the world. Instead, all he felt was tired.

Peter stripped off his shirt, and unbuckled his pants and stripped until he wore swimming trunks alone. It should have made him more vulnerable, standing there with pale skin shining under the sun and curly black hair juxtaposed with white legs, but it only served to make him look more predatory, like the wolf who had just taken off grandmother's clothes.

He pushed off the raft, and clambered onto it. After a minute, Ender joined him and they drifted on steady currents, further into the lake. This is it, Ender thought. He'll push me off and hold me under.

Peter had done that, once, when he was young, come up behind him when he was getting ready to bathe and held him under. If he hadn't had the monitor, he suspected Peter would have killed him. Instead, he let him go and apologized and strolled off. And Ender had sat there for an hour before Valentine found him, wet and shivering, and wrapped a towel around him and stroked his hair and told him she loved him.

And that was his childhood in a nutshell.

Peter just slid off the side himself, though, drifting with curls spread around him in the eddies and currents of the water. He looked vulnerable there, eyes closed, sun beating down on him. Vulnerable and human. Ender reflected suddenly on how easy it would be to reach over and push him under. Just end it. Maybe he would be doing Earth a bigger favor than killing the buggers, just by pushing down and holding.

"It would be easy, huh?" Peter's voice startled Ender out of his reverie and he looked down at the boy floating next to him. "You were thinking about killing me." Peter specified.

"You know I wouldn't."

"You kill somebody?"

"I didn't…I hurt some people. I hurt some people bad." Ender said, and waited for the ridicule, the laughter, the mockery. He didn't know why he was telling Peter this.

"I know." Peter said. "You're like an open book to me. I know all your darkest secrets."

I know, Ender wanted to say. That's why I asked you to come, because when you look at me you know who I am and Valentine would look at me and see only the light and you know about the darkness inside me because it's inside you too…

"You're such a hypocrite." Peter said, and then he crawled onto the raft and Ender felt his muscles tense and he knew that if Peter tried to hurt him, he wouldn't give in. It wasn't in him to lay down without a fight. "You don't want to hurt anyone, you don't want anyone to hurt you, waah waah waah. Little Ender Wiggin, Martyr. Life is so hard for you."

He moved his hand up. Ender caught it before the slap could be completed, grip bruising. Peter smiled unpleasantly. "THIS is what you are, Ender. This is WHO you are. Not some whiny little boy who builds rafts. You're not Huckleberry Finn, Ender-bender, you're a killer."

Ender shook his head, trembling. Peter continued. "You not me, Ender." He said, reverting to slang. "That's why you're out here? You afraid you beat somebody up, break their face in, you going to turn into big brother? You don't have the _cajones_, little boy, little brother. You don't have what it takes to be me."

Ender just looked at him and thought about how much he wanted to hit him, hurt him, beat him, kill him. Peter looked back at him. "You want to hit me? Hit me, little third." He whispered, his voice seductive.

"No!" Ender released his grip on Peter's wrist, the force of his reply echoing over the lake. "I'm not…I _won't_!"

Peter shook his head and shoved him backward roughly. "Should've been me." He muttered.

"Yeah. Should've been you." Ender mimicked and Peter knew he was mocking him and his expression got cold.

And this time Ender didn't cringe away.

"You such a hypocrite. You go up there, you say, I won't kill anyone or hurt anyone—but the buggers, they come and kill everyone and you build them a raft."

"Somebody else can do it." Ender snapped, not liking that Peter's control had held this long. Why was he trying so hard to convince Ender? Why was Peter playing along with their games?

"No, they can't. You aren't much, but you are still a Wiggin. A pissant of a Wiggin, maybe, but we can what nobody else can and that's you too."

"Why do you care?" Ender snarled, his face contorting into something momentarily inhuman. It reminded him of the wolf-children in the playground and he didn't dare to look down, just in case he saw a feral light in the eyes of his reflection.

Peter shrugged. "I told you. I'm going to rule the world."

Ender saw an opportunity and took it. "So you need me to help you?"

That got a rise, that got the anger that Ender had always known was so dangerous. "This isn't about killing anyone or hurting anyone, is it, Ender? This isn't about Ender The Martyr and his little guilt trip. This is about pride. This is about the fact that saving people, saving lives, means nothing to you because, oh, so sorry, they had to screw with your little genius mind to try to create someone strong enough to do what needs to be done. You're thinking, how dare they, but inside, you're just a little boy shivering about to pee his pants."

Ender didn't even try to stop the diatribe now. "This is about fear. Afraid you're going to mess up, get people killed? You realized the game you're playing is for real, and you freaked? Figured out that this time you can't just rebuild if the bugger's knock over your toys? Time to grow up, Ender, time to let those balls drop and realize that if they asked me to come, when they know I hate you more than anyone else in the world, you're not the best hope, you're the only hope they've got."

Peter's mouth gaped in a rictus grin. "And that scares me shitless. I wouldn't trust you as far as Valentine could throw you. But you aren't selling me on this 'I don't give a shit' thing. Because you care. Maybe too much. You bleeding all over this lake and onto that raft and all you really wanted was someone who could see it."

Ender stayed staring past Peter, at something only he could see, so he only heard the splash as his brother dropped off the side of the boat. "Well, I see it, Ender. I know. I get it." Peter said, voice unwontedly soft. "You think you're alone. But you've got Valentine and you've got me, and the three of us, we're not friends, but we're each others and you won't ever be alone, you ugly little bugger-loving Third. Now kick the bugger's ass for me."

Then he pulled himself out of the water and headed up the shore, leaving Ender to stretch out on the raft, and looked at the sky and let tears fall down his cheeks.

Hours later, he took the raft to shore, and walked up to the house. Graff looked at him, and said nothing about the tear tracks down his face.

"I'll see Valentine." Ender said, like a concession, and then he swept into the house.

And somewhere Locke smiled.


End file.
